Deconstruction of the Concept of Masculinity and Patriarchy in the Contemporary Society

The feminine becoming of the masculine in contemporary philosophy. Since the Greeks, Philosophy has been an exclusively masculine discipline. The masculine has always been identified with the human. Nevertheless, the development of feminism at the end of the twentieth century has led to the reassessment of the feminine and its appropriation by men. One can notice this both in Deleuze's and Derrida's work, although in different forms, as well as in Lacan's psychoanalytical thought. The concepts of the 'Undecidable' or 'Difference' (with an 'a') therefore replace phallocentrism or 'phallogocentrism' (Derrida).Under the pressure of homosexual movements, the 'trouble' within gender, as stated by Judith Butler, claims thereafter to replace the 'double' of the sexes, without hurting though in the facts their persistent hierarchy.(Article in French)

To think of distinguishing male hysteria from female hysteria is only a facility of language (especially in the languages that distinguish between the masculine and the feminine). But this facility of language hardly hides that it is crossed by an ideology, which is nothing but that of the established order, whatever the period. It’s obvious that the speech of the master is used to nourish this ideology. Even the psychoanalysts fall into it. Indeed, if one threw a glance on the totality of the articles, books or conferences, clinical and theoretical, one could notice that hysteria is always taken as a feminine notion. Authors always find it necessary to justify to the reader their use of the feminine grammatical form to talk about hysteria. However the great step taken by Jacques Lacan was to define hysteria as a speech, a speech which is part of the only four existing speeches: the speech of the Master, that of the academic, the speech of the hysterical and finally the analytical speech (new comer since Freud stopped talking to let hysteria speak). The place that Lacan gave to the hysterical speech is located between the speech of the Master and the analytical one. What shows well, on the evidence of clinical experiment, that hysteria, for more than one hundred years, and for the first time in the history of humanity, has the choice between submitting and rebelling unceasingly against the speech of the master or producing “herself” a significant, significant-Master, word which will make of hysteria an author, whatever the discipline where this author tries to produce.(Article in French)

Neoliberalism, cultural wars, and the conflict of masculinity in USA (Michel Gueldry)

This article investigates the connection between contemporary capitalism and the crisis of masculinity in the United States. It shed light on the interconnection between, on the one hand, alienating modes of capitalistic production, consumption and labor organization and, on the other end, a pervasive sense of dispossession and isolation among American males, which triggers Angst, violence and other forms of antisocial behavior. This article also explores the representation of masculinity in U.S. popular culture, especially cinema. It highlights the discrepancy between the male social and economic experience, often marked by competitiveness, boredom, isolation, powerlessness and futility, and the cinematic representation of male experience, articulated around fantasies of withdrawal, revenge, bloodshed and heroic myths of malehood.(Article in French)

Depression in men (Zakaria Batty)

In response to calls for much needed research on the relation between gender role conflict and therapy or counseling (Cournoyer & Mahalik, 1995), this study examined the relation between gender role conflict and the types of therapy that men prefer for the treatment of depression, comparing men scoring high and low on the gender role conflict scale. The study also examined whether exposure of men reporting high or low gender role conflict to either emotion-focused or thought-focused therapy through the use of a counseling video influences subsequent preference for type of therapy, and the role of coping as a mediator in the relationship between gender role conflict and therapy preference. Furthermore, the study examined traditional men’s perspectives on therapy focussing in particular on issues inherent in living with the experience of depression: coping with depression, seeking help for depression, and the barriers to seeking help. The central aim of the thesis was to examine how to make psychological services more appealing to men who have experienced depression. The results of stage one suggested that the participants who are high on gender role conflict prefer biomedical therapies/medical services (e.g., medication) more than men who score low on the gender role conflict scale. The results also revealed that both high and low gender role conflicted men ranked modality of therapy first in importance, accessibility second and length of therapy third, and focused on the therapist’s professional characteristics, such as the experience level, more than on the demographic traits of the therapists (e.g. age, race, ethnicity). The results of stage two suggested that exposure of gender role conflicted men to emotion or thought focused therapy affected the participants’ subsequent preferences for therapies. Coping was found to mediate the relations between gender role conflict and therapy preferences, with task coping was significantly related to the three favoured therapies, biomedical, behavioural and psychoanalytical. The results of the last stage of the research revealed several issues associated with depression in men high on gender role conflict. The men reported that the psychosocial stressors associated with their depression are unemployment, financial hardship, failure, social loss and lack of family support. Results also showed that men have difficulties in initiating the help-seeking process, and they prefer to cope with depression on their own, through avoidance or problem solving coping, but not emotional coping. Men’s socialization to fear emotionality, to conceal vulnerability and to be independent was identified as the greatest barrier to seeking help. Establishing rapport and trust was reported to be a central matter in seeking help. The men reported that in order to gain trust and maintain it, the help provider should show them kindness, respect for their independence, security, empathy, have unconditional positive regard and genuineness in talking and listening. Overall the current research revealed insights into men’s experience of depression, their therapy preferences, their coping strategies, the physical and psychosocial barriers that deter them from seeking help, and many practical suggestions for possible interventions to help men cross the barriers and open up. It is concluded that understanding the traditional men, their socialization and its impact on depression, on the man’s help-seeking behavior and attitudes, is certainly needed to assist in meeting the needs of men and to influence the transformation of traditional men.(Article in English)

Through a Romanesque corpus belonging to men and women, the research questions the modification of masculinity starting from representation of the characters and their common relationship to the literal space, highlighting the symbolic violence, “a soft violence” taken as a standard model representing the masculine dominance that seems to be on a decline today. The man is no longer considered in-vivo and in literature as a reference, as the sun that is vital for life. Through his feminization, he is more and more approaching this “dark continent”, as Freud used to qualify women. The modalities of feminine / masculine cleavage are mutating and we have the impression “it is moving”. The symbolic is undermined in its representations.(Article in French)

Evolution of Masculine image and its constancies. (Anne-Marie Houdebine-Gravaud)

From the man -leader (*p-ter of the Sanskrit, always pater familias and dominus, to the overprotective father (papa-poule in French or papa-kangaroo), statutes, social roles of men and their relationships with women have evolved; as mental and social representations; while ancient and so sexist pictures resist. Through linguistic, semantic, semiotic/semiological and ideological analysis, this paper presents this evolution and its implication of transformation and circonstancy in the social and cultural imaginary, concerning relationships between the two sexes (analysis of idiomatic expressions, metaphors, conflicts, types of jobs, and for example kind of toys for children who always demonstrate these sexual and hierarchical distinctions). (Article in French)

What happens to the « eternal masculine » presented by Freud as an anthropological law and promoted to sacred status by Lacan with the “Name of the Father” whose preeminent civilizing role was passed on from Father to Son, when confronted with today’s “eternal feminine”? At this very time when our changing societies are blurring the boundaries between the sexes, are we not witnessing an insidious return of the old ways through words and actions favouring the Son as the Father’s spiritual heir? The contemporary creative production of two members of a family of greek origin, the Prassinos family, the brother and sister, Mario and Gisèle, refers back to that recently attacked if not demolished patriarchal dogma. In the Prassinos family context, the Father’s crumbling pedestal appears to stand firm in its paradoxical permanence, brilliance, emotion, humour even, precisely as the Daughter emerges within the intellectual and artistic sphere heretofore considered as the exclusive territory of Lysander, the Father, and his Son.(Article in French)

Masculinity and Leadership in Some Egyptian Films (Jean Said Makdisi)

This paper examines five Egyptian films whose heroes are in leadership positions to try to identify what masculine qualities are emphasized, idealized, and put up for the admiration of the viewers. Of the five films two are fictional ( sira' fi al nil, directed by Atef Salem) and fi baytuna rajul (directed by Barakat), two are docu-dramas based on the lives of Anwar Sadat and Gamal Abdel Nasser respectively,( ayyam al sadat and Nasser 56) and a satirical theatrical comedy by the popular Adel Imam ( al zaim). Surprisingly all five of the films eschew the normal presentation of macho masculinity, with its emphasis on sexual prowess and physical strength, and present instead an idealized masculinity which praises modesty, intelligence, self-control, kindness, gentleness without in the least sacrificing the notion that masculinity includes virility and sexual attraction. The idealized hero in all these films controls his surroundings and his fate not by physical means (although he knows very well how to employ physicality) but by the moral qualities of understanding, human sympathy, and intellectual depth. Though he has powerful emotions, he never loses control of them, but masters them, channeling their power into helping to create and protect the general good. As a leader this is precisely his main function. (Article in Arabic)

Honor and Changes in Masculinity (Rafif Sidawi)

This study discusses changes in masculinity and its relation to honor, beginning from the family, specifically teenagers. The study was based on three focus groups that included male teenagers aged between 14 and 18. The focus group sessions aimed to find out their opinions about honor and specifically the female’s honor, the male’s honor, and extramarital relations. These discussions revealed typical ideas teenagers have about gender roles. The most significant is their belief that they are guardians of women’s honor which led us to the conclusion that the masculine dominates the concept of women’s honor and is associated to women’s behavior, specifically their sexual behavior. This is the case despite the noticeable changes in masculine values, the modern values that men seem to have adopted, in addition to their more “feminine” lifestyles.(Article in Arabic)

Antara, the noble knight in masculine space (Fadia Hoteit)

This study is concerned with the biography of ‘Antar ibn Cheddad, as he represents a popular conscience that is still in force today in constructing a part of our conceptions and attitudes. The study shows the most important character traits of ‘Antar as presented by his biography, and finds them to be: youth, power and tenacity, the protection of women, the defense of honor, altruism, chivalry, the devotion to the lover, the love of poetry, the fineness of feelings, generosity, modesty, elegance. On the other side, the study presents what a number of young women remember about ‘Antar’ and finds the attributes of lover and poet to be the most prevalent. Comparing ‘Antar’s personality with the modern model of masculinity in Lebanon as presented by researches, the study concludes that ‘Antar was less macho than the modern masculine model presupposes. It argues that the separation between the two sexes that prevailed in the times of ‘Antar made for less separated and opposed gender models than is the case today when the disappearance of social boundaries has reinforced psychological boundaries between the sexes.(Article in Arabic)

The Masculinity of Argileh and the Blurring of Boundaries between the Private and Public (Hosn Abboud)

This study shows how the masculinity of the Argileh is crossing boundaries between the public and private. The writer visited two types of cafés, the internal traditional and the external modern, which are spreading everywhere from the mall to the street, from seashore to the recently flattened southern suburbs of Beirut. The way youth are consuming argileh, an old popular folkloric habit, is closely tied to the patriarchal system of the past, thus changing the image of masculinity and men’s values. Although men are learning to share this public space with women, at the same time, they are blurring the boundaries between public and private, masculinity and femininity, and health and consumerism.(Article in Arabic)

Visualizing Masculinity and its Symbolism (Huda Taleb Srage)

The stamps Stamps of the Arab World as a Case Study Small things can start us off in new ways of thinking. A well-known question in communication theory asks "Who/ says what/ in what channel/ to whom/ with what effects / by means of what symbols?" The channel, in this case study, is postage stamps. The postal vignette has surpassed its main functions (name of the issuing country, value, etc…). It has developed formal structure with figures, events, and ideologies. Furthermore it diversifies symbols in the form of graphic representations, which can be infinitely varied and thus interpreted. The postal object becomes, in this way, an iconic object and, it is in this precise sense, it that will by studied. Although Philately in the Arab World has never been regarded as a scholar discipline, an acute research has been conducted approaching the Stamps of the Arab World starting off from their coming into existence until today (1865-2007). Seeking the features of Masculinity, the stamps are being studied as a medium that reflected the political- ideological processes that have occurred during the last 120 years. The examination of 19000 stamps issued in 19 Arab Countries delivered more than 1000 stamps as a case study to trace the visual representation of desired muscularity. Most importantly, this paper states the outcome of the various readings and conclusions of the study, indicating the fields that masculinity and its symbols that were revealed in the depictured stamps. The paper also traces the diversity of personalized images between Masculine and Feminine and stylized persons.(Article in Arabic)